Finalists for Kirkus Prize in Fiction, Nonfiction, and Young Readers' Literature announced
The three winners will receive $50,000, the biggest award in the literary world
The finalists for the 2023 Kirkus Prize, the richest award in literature at $50,000, have been announced.
Kirkus Reviews editor-in-chief Tom Beer noted, “This year marks the 10th annual Kirkus Prize, and we’re proud to unveil an especially robust slate of finalists to be celebrated, for the first time in the prize’s history, at a ceremony in New York. From gorgeously written and moving fiction, to deeply researched and clear-eyed nonfiction, to young readers’ literature that entertains and educates, the finalists represent the very best books that Kirkus has seen this year.”
The winners will be announced at a ceremony on October 11 and livestreamed on Kirkus’ YouTube channel.
Fiction (Judges: bookseller Rosa Hernandez, book critic Michael Schaub, and Kirkus fiction editor Laurie Muchnick):
Witness – Jamal Brinkley (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
Birnam Wood – Eleanor Catton (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
White Cat, Black Dog – Kelly Link (Random House)
The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store – James McBride (Riverhead)
The Bee Sting -- Paul Murray (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
Let Us Descend --Jesmyn Ward (Scribner)
Nonfiction (Judges: Mark Athitakis, Anjali Enjeti, and Kirkus nonfiction editor Eric Liebetrau):
Red Memory: The Afterlives of China’s Cultural Revolution -- Tania Branigan (Norton)
Mr. B: George Balanchine’s 20th Century -- Jennifer Homans (Random House)
How Not To Kill Yourself: A Portrait of the Suicidal Mind -- Clancy Martin (Pantheon)
How To Say Babylon: A Memoir -- Safiya Sinclair (Simon & Schuster)
Our Migrant Souls: A Meditation on Race and the Meanings and Myths of “Latino” -- Héctor Tobar (MCD/Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
Master Slave Husband Wife: An Epic Journey From Slavery to Freedom -- Ilyon Woo (Simon & Schuster)
Young Readers’ Literature (Judges: Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, high school librarian Ayn Reyes Frazee, and Kirkus young readers’ editors Mahnaz Dar and Laura Simeon):
Together We Swim -- Valerie Bolling, illustrated by Kaylani Juanita (Chronicle Books)
João by a Thread -- Roger Mello, translated by Daniel Hahn (Elsewhere Editions)
Julia and the Shark -- Kiran Millwood Hargrave, illustrated by Tom de Freston (Union Square Kids)
The Skull: A Tyrolean Folktale -- Jon Klassen (Candlewick)
America Redux: Visual Stories From Our Dynamic History -- Ariel Aberg-Riger (Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins)
The Eternal Return of Clara Hart -- Louise Finch (Little Island)